More Than A Feeling
by angel-death-dealer
Summary: After being rescued, Kate becomes pregnant. Shocked, Jack makes a mistake that may cost Kate and the baby their lives. Will they pull through? Major Jate alert!
1. The Wrong Five Minutes

**Ok, I know I'm silly because now I have to update 4 Lost stories at once. (Sighs) Oh dear...so much Lost...so little time. Anyway, this is set once they're off the island. Bear in mind that whatever happens, this is a JATE story!**

"Jack, I'm pregnant."

The words echoed around his mind as if there was no way of getting rid of them. He didn't know what to say, what do do, anything. Pregnant? How? Why?

"What?" He asked, maybe he had just heard her wrong.

"I'm pregnant, Jack." She repeated. "I'm going to have a baby...your baby."

Suddenly, everything had changed. He and Kate had been together for a while now, four months, and they hadn't even got their own place together. He was still applying for jobs around hospitals and medical clinics, and Kate was on parole. How would they get by with three of them, and no money coming in between them? They had only been off the island for a few weeks.

"How?" It was all he could think of to say.

She looked at him, a serious expression on her face. "I think you know how."

She was sat on the couch before him, and he had been standing in the kitchen, making them a drink each. The drinks had been forgotten now, as had every bit of sense in Jack's brain. "I-I thought we'd been careful." He said aloud. "I thought we were going to get our own place together first, save up some decent money..."

What made the situation worse in his mind was that the area in which they lived was high in crime, and his apartment was broken into more or less once a fortnight, and hers wasn't much better. This was no place, no time, for a child.

"Jack, what are you saying?" She asked him.

"How can we raise a child on the money we have at the moment?" He asked her, not expecting an answer, but he got one anyway, even if it was on a shaking voice.

"We'll find a way." Kate said half-confidently.

"We've barely got enough money to pay bills, to buy food, let alone have a baby." She didn't like his tone of voice now. It was getting to the point where she knew firmly what his decision was. They hadn't had an argument since they had been together, and now, she thought that things would be different from all the other relationships she had had, that he would be different, but apparently, that had all been wishful thinking.

"You don't want it, do you?" She asked, scared of his answer, not wanting to know it, even though she had to ask. Tears were rolling down her cheeks now, freely flowing from the dispair and rejection she felt.

"I want to be able to provide for my child." He said in reply. There was no 'yes' or 'no' answer. He couldn't even answer a straight question.

"We can." She told him. She'd find a way to provide for her baby, even if she had to go hungry herself.

"Not like this, Kate." He told her, motioning to the room around them. True, in Jack's small apartment, which was only temporary until they had the money to buy a bigger place together, there was barely enough room for the two of them, let alone another. This was the same in her apartment, which was only a little bigger, but couldn't possibly have enough room for a cot and everything else they'd need.

"Please, don't ask me to get rid of it." She begged, her voice faltering as she said it.

He had never heard her voice so pleading, so desperate. _What am I thinking? This is my baby, our child. _He backtracked from all he had said, but to no suprise, she cut him off. "It's not-"

"You're the last person I would have expected this from, Jack." She said. "This has happened to me before, remember?"

How could he forget? Kate had once told him that when she had left high school, she had gotten pregnant, and even though she was young, her boyfriend at the time, Craig, had offered to help her out, and so had her parents, but at four months, she had lost the baby. After she had come out of hospital, after the miscarriage, Craig had left her, saying that he hadn't wanted the responsibility anyway. Tom Brennan had been her friend at the time anyway, and was the only person besides her parents who had been there for her to pick up the peices of what she had left to live for.

"Yeah," He said softly, "I remember."

"If I don't have this baby, I might not have a chance for another. You know that." She told him.

"Kate, I-"

She had enough. She didn't want to hear anything he had to say. Standing up, she went over to the counter where her bag and car keys were. "You know what, if you think that I'll give this baby up, you're sadly mistaken, Jack. I'm going home."

She walked over to the door, but Jack called after her. "Kate...Kate!"

"Goodbye Jack."

"Kate, wait!"

The door slammed behind her, leaving behind a silence that deafened him. He slouched against the door, pounding his fist on it in anger. "I want the baby." He said to himself, knowing that if he had said it five minutes earlier, things wouldn't be like this.


	2. Chapter 2

After a while, Jack had gone to Charlie's apartment, thinking that drowing his sorrows was the best option. However, after being there for half an hour, he hadn't had a single drink, and had taken to calling Kate at her apartment. Hanging up the phone for the fifteenth time, he sighed, giving up.

"She's not answering." He said, stating the obvious. "It's just her machine."

"Her answering machine?" Charlie asked him stupidly.

"No, funnily enough her washing machine picked it up." He replied sarcastically. "Yes her goddamn answering machine!" He snapped back.

"Woah, calm down!" Charlie said, sitting forward in his chair as Jack paced up and down. The pair had been close friends on the island seeing as they were there for two years, but Charlie had never seen Jack so angry at himself, not even after Boone died.

"Calm down?" Jack repeated, as if the idea was absurd. "What if something's happened to her?"

"What do you mean?" Charlie asked. "She was with you half an hour ago, how could something have happened to her?" None of this was making any sense to him at all.

"She was really upset." Jack said painfully, angry with himself. _God, I made her cry. _

"About what?" He didn't get a response, and Jack continued to pace. "Jack, are you actually going to tell me what happened or do I have to guess?" He said, tired of guessing.

Jack stopped pacing and supported himself on the back of the tattered couch with his arms. "She's pregnant, Charlie, Kate's pregnant."

"Pregnant?" He repeated, as if it were a word he had never heard before. "You mean..?"

"She's having a baby." Jack said. "My baby."

"Congratulations, man." Charlie said, splitting a grin at him. Jack realised that this was the least of a reaction he should have made. "But, what's so bad about that?"

He sighed, again. "I said the wrong thing - as usual."

Charlie shook his head. "What did you do?"

"Neither of us has enough money for ourselves at the moment. We'll need for a baby - money we don't have until I get a job. I said that there was no way we could raise a child properly until the money situation has improved." Thinking back, even now, it seemed like a stupid idea - it wouldn't take nine months for a job to come along. "She got upset, stormed out."

Charlie got a serious expression on his face which unnerved Jack quite a bit. "Stormed out?"

"Took her car keys and left." He said, having a brief flashback to the moment.

"Wait a sec, she drove?" Charlie asked.

Jack nodded. "Yeah. Why?"

Charlie shook his head. "Women don't drive so well when they're angry, or upset; worst if it's both. Trust me, I've been in the passenger seat before."

This didn't help Jack's nerves and thoughts that something bad had happened at all. "What happened?" He asked.

"Mild concussions and a killer bruise, few scars as well." He said as if he were proud of them.

Jack run his hands over his face and through his hair. "I can't believe I said that to her."

"Well, did you mean it?" Charlie asked, trying to think of this logically seeing as Jack was having a hard time doing that.

"I meant that it would be hard for us, but I never said that I didn't want it. She just kind of assumed it." He explained. _How could I have ever wanted to get rid of my own child?_

"So you do want it?"

"Of course I do!" He said, almost snappingly. "That's my kid - our kid - how could I now want it?"

"It's not me you should be saying that to." Charlie pointed out.

Jack knew that, but it was proving hard. "I'd say it to her if she'd just pick up the phone." He said, a little more harshley than he should have done.

"Go round to her place then." Charlie said, as if it were as easy as he was thinking it out to be.

"She won't let me in." Jack said. "Not after what I've done to her."

"Then sit outside her door until she lets you in." Jack looked up at him, unable to tell if Charlie was a genius or insane. Charlie opened his hands in emphasis. "She'll have to open the door sometime."

Jack let out a choked laugh, clearly Charlie, being a ladies man, had done this before. "Good idea." He was about to speak again when his cell phone rang in his pocket. He scrambled to get it out before it stopped ringing. "Kate?" He asked, answering it without thinking it could be anyone else.

"Jack Shephard?" An unfamilar female voice asked him. It wasn't Kate.

He sighed, he had hoped that it was Kate ringing him back. "Yes?"

"DCI Gaby Hughes here. Am I right in that you know the owner of a Ford Mondeo?"

_Kate's car? _"Yeah, why?"

"There's been an accident on the highway." He could have sworn his heard had stopped. Charlie watched the colour drain from his face instantly, and there was instant distress written upon his face. "The only clue to the identity of the driver we were able to salvage was your number in the glove department."

"An accident?" He repeated throatily. "Is she all right?" He had to find the couch behind him to sit down on, before he fell down with shock.

"As far as we can tell, the driver of the Mondeo wasn't the cause of the accident. She was just caught up in the tail end of it." DCI Hughes explained, but she hadn't answered his question.

"Is she all right?" He repeated, louder.

"We're taking her to the hospital, but if you could give us her details and contact any of her family, someone who can be with her at the hospital, just in case, it would be most helpful." _In case of what?_

"She's alright, isn't she?" He asked again, he had to know.

"I'm sorry, I can't confirm that until we're back at the hospital Mr Shephard." His heart sank deeper, that wasn't a good answer. "The details, please?"

"Her name's Kate Austen, and I'll be there." He said, filled with guilt.

He hung up the phone, staring at it as if it were alien. He was suddenly aware of Charlie who had been watching him while he was on the phone. "What happened?" He asked him.

"Kate." He said quietly, not wanting to repeat what he had just been told. _They wouldn't even tell me if she's all right..._ "She's-they're taking her to the hospital. She's been in a car accident."


	3. Chapter 3

Jack sat in the waiting area of the Accident and Emergency wing of the hospital. They had just taken Kate in to prepare her for surgery, and she was only half-conscious when they had wheeled her through, but she was moaning in agony. They hadn't allowed Jack to see her yet, even though he was a doctor, so hearing her pain, and knowing that he was the cause of it, broke his heart. She probably didn't even know he was there, waiting for her. If he had said the right thing, rather than letting the first words that came into his head spill out, she wouldn't have been involved in that accident, and she wouldn't be in so much pain.

Jack and Charlie, who had stayed with him to try and keep him sane, took up seats outside the Observation Room, and spent ten minutes listening to her consistant agony before they put her out. Charlie saw the look on Jack's face as the sounds of her pain surrounded them, and he looked like someone was playing a tug of war with his ears; and when he had heard her calling out his name in sobs, he looked to the door helplessly and wanted nothing better than to hide away and stop the screams. Instead, he kept his gaze on the door, and whispered gently, even though she couldn't hear it; "I'm here, Kate. I'm right here." Doctors came over constantly, asking them questions, questions that he had onces asked on a daily basis. Who was she? Did she have any allergies to medications? Was she currently taking medication? Jack answered as best he could, but in the end there was only so much he could say without having to hear another of her moans. Jack suddenly realised how much pain relatives had been in when he had operated on people, and then had to speak to them. He understood every feeling that was running through them.

When the wheeled her out and into surgery after putting her into an unconscious sleep, Jack stood up instantly, followed by Charlie, and saw the sight of his blood covered love. Even though they had tried to clean her up a little, red smears still remained on her once untainted skin, first streaked with tears, now with blood. It would haunt him forever, seeing her like that, pale, lifeless even. She could have been dead at that moment and if he weren't a doctor, he wouldn't know the difference. How many people had he seen in this condition throughout his career? Too many count, but now that Kate was one of them, it was a completely different sight, especially as he knew who's eyes hid behind those lifeless lids. One doctor approched him, whom he had known from when he worked there. His name was Damon Burrows, and he and Jack had been in med school together. 

"Jack?" Damon asked, extending his hand to shake his. Jack wearily shook it back. "Long time no see, I'll be operating on your Fiancee." He had to lie about being her fiancee to the hospital desk just so he could stay with her seeing as no one else was around who was family.

"How is she?" Jack asked with a break in his voice.

"I'll be honest with you, Jack, it's not looking promising." Damon said awkwardly.

Jack looked like he was about to cry. "What do you mean 'not promising'?" He asked desperately. "She's going to be all right, isn't she?" _She has to be all right. She just has to be._ He couldn't lose her, not now, not when he had made the biggest mistake of his life. He had always known that he would pay for his mistakes, but he found himself begging whoever was up there not to take her away from him. _I'll do anything, just please, let me keep her._

"Jack, you have to understand, she is is seriously hurt. Providing the surgery goes well, we _may _be able to save her." He explained, putting an emphasis on the word 'may' that gave Jack the sinking feeling that there was no hope at all. He remembered his fathers words, "people would rather pay attention to that 1 of hope than the 99 against them." He was right, for once. Jack was willing to hope on less than that if it meant Kate would be all right.

"And the baby?" He asked, just as helplessly. _I might not just lose Kate, I'm going to lose my baby as well._

Damon looked at Jack strangely, as if a large problem had just dawned on him. "Baby?" Jack didn't like the look on his face, it sent fear down his spine. His voice wouldn't respond, his tongue was glued to the insides of his mouth.

"She's pregnant." Charlie explained, stepping in when Jack found himself unable to answer.

Damon didn't look overly thrilled about this. "This does complicate matters somewhat." He admitted, and Jack hung his shoulders, running his hands over his face before looking back at Damon with tear filled eyes.

"Please," He begged, finding his voice and now choking back tears. "Please, tell me they'll both be all right." Charlie looked on, concerned not only for Kate, but for the man that he had never seen beg for anything. His leader, who was always confident, always knew what to do, but was pleading like there was no tomorrow for him. The man who had been their island leader was reduced to near nothing because Kate was possibly dying.

The doctor was quiet for a moment and then replied. "I'm sorry, that isn't a promise I can make." He said.

"What?" Jack asked in disbelief. He was a doctor! Wasn't that what Doctors did? He always made that promise. But wasn't that his downfall? He had promised he'd fix Sarah, even though he thought he couldn't...He'd promised to fix Kate's heart...had he done that? Well, yes, if only for a while...

"The baby may prove to be a complication during the surgery that we need to save her life. There's a chance that we may have to abort the baby to save her." Damon told him, even though he knew that this was something Jack would already know. "Kate's life is the main priority here."

The word 'abort' stung his ears, and now he was really having to fight his tears. _I didn't mean it, Kate. Really, I didn't. I'm sorry. _His voice was breaking dangerously as he spoke. "No, you don't understand." He explained, repeating Kate's words from earlier. "If she loses this baby she might now ever have another. I can't lose them."

"There's still a chance, Jack, even if it is a small one." He assured, holding a hand up to try and calm Jack "How far along is she?" He asked.

Jack thought back, had she mentioned that? No, she hadn't. "I don't know. She only told me a few hours ago." He said.

"Jack, I've dealt with similar cases to this and seen mothers up to seven months pregnant come through with their lives and go on to have a normal delivery and healthy baby." He said, which gave Jack some hope. "But as she isn't showing yet, she can't be more than three months, at the very most. So that does narrow the child's chances, if it wasn't killed during the accident of course."

Jack tried again to explain. "You don't understand, she-"

"Let me hazard a guess? She thinks you don't want the baby, drove away upset, and thus impaired her driving." Jack nodded a little. "I see cases like this every day. I'll do all I can to save them both. It will be a few hours at least until the surgery is completed. If you leave a number at the front desk we can call you if there's any problems."

There was no way he was sitting at home waiting for a phonecall to say that something had gone wrong. He shook his head firmly. "No, I'm not going anywhere." He said stubbornly.

"I understand." Damon said, before going down to the operating theater.


	4. Chapter 4

Hours later, Kate was still in theater, and no one had come out to tell him what, if anything, was happening. Jack was pacing the corridor helplessly, and by now, Charlie had called Sayid and Sun, deciding that they were best of to calm him down together. Charlie had explained to them what was happening, seeing as Jack had gone into a trance, blocking out all attempts to comfort him. Charlie didn't even think he knew that the others had arrived.

"How could I have been so stupid?" Jack said aloud to himself, breaking out of his trance, and hitting his forehead with the palm of his hand.

"It was just the shock talking, Jack." Sun reasoned. It wasn't until she responded that Jack realised he was speaking out loud.

However, Jack continued pacing as if he hadn't heard Sun's comment. "She doesn't even know that I was happy about it...she left before I could tell her. Now I might not get to tell her at all." He said sadly, but with a hint of frustration.

"Hey, think positive, man." Charlie encouraged.

"Think positive?" Jack said adburdly. "Positive? Look what I've done to her!" He gestured towards the doors that Kate had been taken through. "A doctor just told me there's only a small chance of Kate surviving, let alone both of them. It's pretty hard to think happy thoughts right now!" Jack explained. All he could think about was the idea of Kate lying there, dead, and the image of her coming out of observation covered in blood..._you may as well have made those wounds with your own hands..._

"Come on, Jack," Sayid continued. "This is _Kate _we're talking about. She's been through more than any of us put together. She's not about to quit over this. She's a fighter." He said her name as if she were some kind of legend. A phoenix even, who could never really die.

"Even if she does pull through, we'll probably lose the baby." He said grimly. _Our first and probably last chance for a child and I've ruined it. _He didn't want to lose the baby, he wanted to watch his child grow up. He wanted to be a father; to play with them, teach them things, hear their first words, watching them crawl, and eventually walk from one smiling parent to the other.

"Don't worry, Jack, they'll be OK." Charlie said, he had lost count of the amount of times they had said it between them now.

Jack punched the wall in response. "Why didn't I tell her how I really felt?" He said through clenched teeth. Leaning back against the wall beside the chairs the others sat on, he slid down it until he was sitting on the floor, knees drawn up by his chest, and resting his head in his hands.

"How did you really feel?" Sayid asked him.

He looked down at his fist. It was bleeding slightly from the contact with the wall, and he could feel a sting of pain as he flexed it, but somehow that made him feel better. "I felt...happy - really happy. I should have hugged her and kissed her and told her how excited I was." He continued talking, not sure whether the others were actually listening or not, but he didn't care, he needed to say this to someone, something, even if it was the air infront of him. "That's why I was so concerned about money and being able to provide for them. I just don't want my kids to end up with a father like mine, who was useless." He started to get choked up again, and looked determinedly away from the others. "But any minute now, I might not be a Dad. I might not be right now - and it's all my fault."

Once again, Sun said that first thing one would say in this situation. "Jack, it's not your fault, it could have happened to anyone."

"It is my fault." He said quietly, staring off into space, and they could all see the layer of tears brimming his eyes. "If I hadn't have been such a jerk she wouldn't have stormed out, and she wouldn't have been caught in that accident." This time, he actually used his sleeve to wipe over his eyes. "If she dies...if they die...it'll be my fault."

* * *

"Dr Shephard? Jack?"

Jack's head snapped up from the wall. He had been leaning back in the same position for hours, and had leaned his neck as far back as it would go so that if he opened his eyes, he would have been looking at the ceiling. For the past two hours he had been repeating the same thing over and over again in his head. _Please, let them be ok, let her be ok, don't take her away from me. _A few times he had said it aloud without realising it, but the others had said nothing, unsure of what to say to him.

He looked up to see the same doctor, Damon, standing beside him with a clipboard in his hand. He got to his feet as quickly as he could. "Is she all right?" He asked.

"I'm sorry to say that during the operation, Kate slipped into a coma." Damon told him.

"A coma?" He repeated as if the word were nonsense to him. "Shes going to come out of it though, right?" The others all watched him, unsure whether he was going to burst into tears or hit someone. He had seen too many cases where they had seen patients fall into comas and never wake up.

"When she wakes up, there's no reason at all why she shouldn't make a full recovery in time."

"So she's OK?" He asked, just to be sure. _She's alive!_

"In a manner of speaking, yes."

Jack placed his hands over his face, wiping away the anxiety from the past few hours. She was Ok, she was alive. "And the baby?" He asked. He begged silently that the baby was alive. He had had to tell patients too many times that their unborn child had not survived surgury, and he didn't think that he could do that with Kate. He didn't think he could handle that crushed look on her face to know that she had lost another child.

"Thanks to you telling us, the baby also survived. If we hadn't known, and operated anyway, we would have lost them both no doubt." Damon said. "In theory, you saved their lives." _They're both alive... _

"Thank god." Jack said, grinning and wanting to shout out loud. "Thank you, thank you so much." He said to Damon.

"Only doing my job." He said.

"You've just made my life worth living again." Jack told him with such relief that anyone could see that this man was truly happy for one reason or another.

"Just to let you know, providing on her health when she wakes from the coma, it will be a few weeks at least until she can leave the hospital. And even then she will need constant care leading up to the birth." Damon added.

Jack didn't care what it took, Kate and his child were alive. "Don't worry, they've got me." _I've just got to tell her that...I'm never going to make this mistake again. _All he had to do was tell Kate how he really felt about everything.

"I'm glad to hear that." The doctor said with a smile. "She'll need you." Jack nodded, knowing that he needed her just as much. The question of it was whether or not Kate would let him take care of her, after all, she was a stubborn woman.

"Can I go in there?" Jack asked. "Please, I've just got to be with her when she wakes up."

"I think that sounds Ok." Damon said.

The others followed Jack and the doctor as they were led to the intensive care unit. Once they reached room 3, recognisable by the red plaque which reminded Jack disturbingly of the blood he had seen on Kate's face earlier, they stopped, and watched while he alone entered the room. He stood in the doorway of the room to see her lying in the bed, her arms draped over the blankets. She was still deathly pale, and the oxygen mask over her nose and mouth was making sure that she didn't stop breathing. Even though Jack had been in hospitals most of his life, it scared him a little to see the tubes coming out of her arms, some draining fluid and some inserting it. In fact, the one thing that assured him that she was alive was the regular beeping coming from a machine that he knew to be a heart moniter. What little colour there had been on her face earlier was gone. The doctor had said she was in a coma, but Jack thought he was staring at a dead body.

Welling up completely, and uncontrollably, Jack leaned against the doorframe, hiding his face from the three men who watched their helpless friend and leader. For a minute or so, he just stood their and cried, longer, and harder, then he had done since he was a small child. Nothing had brought so much pain to his heart in years. He was soon aware of a hand on his shoulder, and knew when the person spoke that it was Sayid.

Not thinking of anything but what he had done, Sayid and Jack embraced, as friends do, and he carried on crying.

"What have I done?" He sobbed. "Left, Look at her. She looks dead."

Sayid didn't need to look at her, he had already seen her lying there, lifeless. "Come on, Jack." He said. "You've got to stay strong. You've got to go in there, and talk to her, get her to wake up."

Jack pulled away from Sayid, and took a few obedient steps into the room. He seemed to stumble a little, like a lost child looking for safety, only to be met with the most curious and horrific sight imaginable. It was almost as if he wanted to stay away, so he could not see the damage that he had caused, but he knew in his heart that he needed to be at her side. No one could believe that they had to tell Jack, of all people, to be strong. He vaugely heard the doctor telling him that it was thought that whilst in a coma, patients could hear the voices around them, and this strengthened their will to wake from the come.

"If there's any change at all, please call someone." Damon said, before leaving Jack alone with Kate.

Going slowly over to the bedside, he half expected her to open her eyes, her beautiful eyes which would contrast so wonderfully to the dullness of the room, and smile at him. Then he looked down at her stomach, knowing now that their was a child alive inside, their child. How could he have wanted to get rid of it, even for a second? _Any child coming from someone as beautiful as Kate is a gift. _He thought, then mused on that more. _My gift. I'm going to be a Dad. _Even in his head, the words were filled with awe.

Here it was, his chance to prove to everyone that he wasn't going to turn into his father. He was going to be nothing but loving towards Kate, unlike his father had been. Christian Shephard wasn't the perfect husband and father. He also made it common knowledge that Jack was nothing more than a poison to him, a plague, something that he wanted removed from sight. He found it hard to believe that anyone could ever feel like that about their child, but earlier on, he had come very close to becoming his father. _You did it, Jack, you passed the test. _

Sitting down on a chair at Kate's bedside, he took her limp hand in his. It felt warm, which comforted him, not stone cold like the dead. No, she was very much alive. He squeezed her hand lightly, letting out the breath he didn't even realise he was holding, and then tentatively reached out towards her stomach. He took another breath, deeper this time, and carefully laid his hand on her stomach, as if just being near her was the most precious gift in the world. Until the baby was born, this was as close as he would get to his child.

He kept his hand on her abdomen, but looked up at her face. She didn't even look like she was in a coma, whatever that looked like. This close, he could see her chest gently rising and falling with slow, shallow breaths. It was more like she was just asleep. _Yeah, _Jack told himself, _she's just asleep, and any minute now she's going to wake up, and tell you what a jerk you are, and you can apologize and tell her that you...that you love her._

He hadn't seriously told her that he was in love with her yet. He had played around with the phrase, they both had, saying that he loved things about her, and loved being with her, but it was taking him more guts to come out and say those three words on their own than he had planned on. He knew now that he had to tell her, and planned on telling her at the first chance he got, but first of all, she had to know that he was sorry.

"Come on Kate," He urged, oblivious to the four men watching. "You have to wake up." He looked down at her stomach, letting his fingers wander over the shape of her abdomen. "You have to wake up for this, for our baby."


	5. Chapter 5

**This will be the last post up before Xmas. Hopefully I'll get another chapter up before New Years, but if not, then it's back to fighting updates with college work :( Damn college. So Happy Xmas everyone!**

A week later, and Kate still hadn't woken up. Doctors waltzed in and out of the room, checking the machines were running Ok, and noting down some of the signals it was giving off that Jack couldn't even begin to understand in his present state, but still, he didn't move from her side. When he was desperate for sleep, and found his eyelids drooping, he would lean forwards onto the edge of the bed, supporting his head with one arm, and would sleep at her side, still holding her hand. Even though he only got a few hours sleep at the most, he still refused to leave her side unless it was only for a few minutes at a time, and even then he would race back to her side, incase she had woken up while he was gone. Jack had winced when he was told that she could remain in her coma for weeks, possibly months. _No, _he told himself, _she will wake up. She won't want to miss her baby growing._

Jack talked to her a lot, just as the doctor told him to. He told her anything - the weather that day, how he envisioned the future. Sometimes, he half expected her to wake up and correct him. When she didn't though, it broke his heart. "I love you so much, Kate." He said, knowing that she could hear him now. "We've been through quite a lot together, haven't we? You're not just my girlfriend anymore, now. You're so much more special, more precious to me. You're the mother of my child. Our child, we can do this together, no matter what. Even if you don't want to wake up for me, wake up for your baby, Kate."

When Sawyer entered the room on the eighth morning, he brought with him a colourful bunch of flowers, that was contained in a clear glass vase filled with water. Jack managed to come out of his trance to give Sawyer a strange look, but the look faded as he watched his friend set the vase on the empty table beside Kate's bed.

"Thought she might want to see somethin' other than machines, and smell something other than that hospital corridor smell when she woke up." He explained. "'Specially as she'll be here a while when she does."

Jack nodded. "Good idea." He knew that after what had happened when she lost her last baby, that she hated being around hospitals, so she wasn't going to be overly thrilled to have to stay in for weeks. "Besides, she loved spending time in Sun's garden on the island."

Kate's accident had even brought out the devestation in Sawyer. He was spending just as much time as Jack up the hospital, waiting in the corridor for news. They all knew that Sawyer still cared for her, but he had given up, knowing that Jack made her happy.

"Any change?" He asked solemly.

Jack shook his head, the same notion repeated every morning. "Doctor's been in, said she won't be waking up today." He said sadly. He wanted her to be awake again, he wanted to see her smiling, to hold her in his arms and tell her that she was going to be all right.

Sawyer took the chair on the other side of Kate, which through half of the night, while Jack slept for an hour or so, had been occupied by Sayid. He took a look at Jack. He had barely left this room in days, and he had certainly not left the hospital. His hair was messed, where he kept on running his fingers through it in frustration, and he had not showered in ages. The bags under his eyes looked fit to stay; and Sawyer was starting to think that he looked worse off than Kate did. The only thing that hadn't changed about his appearance recently, was the look of hope in his eyes as he looked down on Kate's body as she lay in her coma.

"Jack, go home." Sawyer said. Jack looked up at him, and then back at Kate. "You're exhausted."

"I'm not going anywhere." Jack said quietly but stubbornly, stroking Kate's hand with his thumb.

"Something to eat then?" Sawyer tried.

"I'm not hungry." Was the reply. Sawyer knew that he was hungry though. Jack hadn't eaten for days now, and he knew that he hadn't eaten much on the day of accident because he was meant to be going for a meal with Kate that evening, which, of course, they never turned up to.

The way he was going, Jack was going to be in no state to help Kate when she woke up. Sawyer tried a different approach. "What if, in a worse case scenario, she doesn't wake up for a month, maybe two?" Sawyer asked him. "You gonna sit here, not eating, not sleeping, until then?"

"If I have to." Came Jack's distraced, yet stubborn, reply. Sawyer sighed - this sounded a lot easier when Claire had suggested it.

"It's impossible Jack." He told him. "Go home, just for a while, have a sleep, have a shower, whatever, just rest up a bit."

"I'm not leaving her." He said, his voice full of emotion. _I can't leave her, not like this. I want her back, I need her back._

"Jack-"

"You don't understand, Sawyer. I have to be here when she wakes up. She has to know that I'm sorry." He said. Why could no one understand why he had to be there? He wanted to be the first thing she saw when she woke up, the first person she spoke to.

"You said it yourself, Jack-O." Sawyer pointed out. "She won't be waking up today. Tomorrow's another day as Freckles says." Jack sighed heavily, dipping his head a little. He knew that Sawyer was right, but admitting that he was right was hard for him. "Listen, she won't be on her own. We'll be here. I'm not goin' anywhere until you get back. I'll ring you if anything happens." He promised.

"Thanks." Jack said, standing up but not releasing her hand.

"Now if I see you in here before you're wide awake, or if you've still got that ridiculous stubble, I'll chase you back out again. It's too long to be stubble and too short to be a beard - get rid of it." Sawyer warned him playfully.

"Alright I'll shave." Jack said, taking the hint with a little smile. He looked down at Kate, and then leaned down and kissed her forehead softly. "I'll be back later, baby." He said quietly, hoping that, just like in fairytales, that was all it took to wake her up. Giving her hand one more squeeze he stood up and made the leave the room.

"Hold up, Doc." Sawyer intervened, making Jack turn around. "You own me 20 bucks."

He looked confused. "What?"

"You heard me, 20 bucks."

"How come?" Jack asked. He definately didn't remember making a bet with Sawyer. That was like jumping into a shark pool covered in raw meat - it just wasn't something that you did in your right mind. You either ended up humiliated, broke, or in hospital.

"When we were in the hotel, down in the bar-" Ok, they were in the bar, that automatically meant that Jack didn't remember. "-I bet you 20 that you would call Freckles 'Baby' in front of someone else within six months of going out, you bet the other way."

"Oh come on!" Jack said aloud. "That doesn't count. I was drunk."

"A drunk man's words are a sober man's thoughts." He encouraged wiseles and holding out his hand. "Pay up."

Jack fished around in his pockets and pulled out a twenty dollar bill. "Fine." He said, handing it over. "But you're buying the next round of coffee."

"Haha." Sawyer replied sarcastically, with a small laugh.

"What now?" Jack asked, wondering how twenty bucks could make him so happy.

"By handing over the money so easily, you've proved that you enjoyed saying that particular four letter word, and are likely to say it again in the near future." Sawyer said professionally, even though it was something he had read in a magazine ten minutes before.

"Shut up." Jack said with a grin as he left the room.

* * *

When he got home, Jack managed to get six hours sleep before having a shave and a shower. He looked, and felt much better afterwards, but there was something in him that still felt wrong, and he realised that it was because Kate was in the hospital still. At 4pm, he had driven back to the hospital, and although his hopes were up, he felt quite disappointed when he went back into the room and Kate was still comatose. He set the bag down on the floor beside the bed, and then took up his seat once again.

"See, miles better." Sawyer observed coming back from where he had pulled the shades up and was looking out of the window. He sat back down again on the opposite side of the bed.

"No change?" Jack asked, running a hand down her cheek before clasping her hand again.

"Nothing." Sawyer said.

"Doctor been around yet?" Jack asked to get over the disappointment that she had not made any change at all.

"Not yet." Sawyer said, checking his watch to see if the time had gone past. It hadn't. There was still another twenty minutes before the doctor was due back. "You look better off now."

"Yeah. It was hard to get to sleep, but I managed to get a good few hours in." Jack told him.

"What's in the bag?" He asked, pointing to the bag by Jack's feet.

"I stopped by Kate's. Picked up a few of her things." Inside the bag were a pair of pyjamas and her bath robe, as he knew that she wouldn't want to spend a few weeks in a hospital gown, as well as some magazines for her when she woke up, along with a few books. She liked reading, it was her escape from reality.

"Well, I'm off for a sleep myself." Sawyer said, getting up and stretching his legs. "Is Charlie still hanging about?"

Jack nodded, still unable to believe that Sawyer had been at the hospital nearly as much as he had. "He's out there with Claire talking about one of his tours. I think she's buying it."

Sawyer grinned cheekily. "Time to go embarass the VH1 Has been."He said.

"Leave him to it, Sawyer. Let him score for once." Jack said.

Sawyer looked defeated, "All right, I'll go find a game to score on myself."

"Beth?" Jack asked, referring to one of the survivors that Sawyer had gone quite friendly with.

Sawyer looked shifty. "Maybe."

"I'm not stupid, Sawyer. I've seen the two of you together." It was true, The infamous James "Sawyer" Ford had finally found a girl he could spend more than two consecutive nights will, and he was too manly to admit that he was falling for her.

"Not a word to the others." He said, pointing at Jack. "Or Freckles won't be the only one in a coma."

Jack laughed a little as Sawyer left the room, and as the door closed, it was silent once again save for the beeping of the machines.


	6. Chapter 6

In the middle of the night, Jack checked his watch with a small yawn. 2.25. Another week had passed, and still, Kate was comatose. He felt tired, but for some reason, he felt more compelled to stay awake tonight than he did at any other time. His direction, as always, was towards Kate. No matter what, he didn't take any chances in leaving her. His love for her was right beside her, and he wished that she could know that. He had to crack a small smile at the thought that peoply only get these things together, and admit how they feel, after something bad happens. He would rather have died in that car accident himself, than to see her like she was now.

"Hey," He said quietly, in little more than a whisper. He no longer felt strange, talking to someone who could hear him but not respond. "I know you can hear me, Kate." He said, his voice sounding determined. "Wake up, baby." He chided himself, realising that Sawyer was right, he had said it again. "Come on, Kate, wake up. You've made it this far - you'll be in the clear as long as you just open your eyes. You can do it, I know you can." He brought her hand up to his mouth and kissed it. "If you wake up, we'll be a ... a family. Our own family."

The word family felt strange to him. He had never had much of a family life, but now, he was going to. Kate had given him that. He closed his eyes, putting his forehead down on their clasped hands. "Please." He said, feeling tears coming again, this time, knowing that he was alone until the morning rounds at 6am, he didn't try to fight them off. He felt the hot sting of the tears escape his eyes, dripping down onto both his hands and Kate's. For ten minutes, he cried quietly, but he was inconsoluble as he did so. "Please, Kate, wake up."

The first thing Kate was aware of was a dull pain throbbing through her body. It wasn't unbearable, just an annoying pain. She felt as if she were being dragged back into sleep, despite the feeling of having slept for ages. Her head ached more than anything else, but she could deal with it. Her next thought was trying to think what had happened. Where was she? Her eyelids still felt heavy, and although she could hear things around her, she couldn't open them. She tried to force herself to open her eyes, having finally left the limbo-like state she had been in for however long. Beside her, came the sound of sobbing, and as the feeling returned to her limbs, she could feel someone clasping her hand tightly.

_Who's crying? _She wondered. _Why are they crying? _Beneath the crying, she heard beeping. She had heard that sound of beeping before, machines...moniters. Was she in hospital? Why? What was going on? Then, she heard a voice beside her, thick from crying, but unmistakable in identity. "Please, Kate, wake up." _Jack? _She tried to call out to him, but her voice came out in a moan.

"Kate?" He got another moan in response. "Kate, can you hear me?" He said, surpising that his voice was still coming in sobs, and his face was still running with fresh tears.

"Ja-" She started to say, before becoming cut off by yet another moan. "Jack?"

"It's alright, Kate, you're gonna be fine." He assured her, as he leaned over to press the call button for someone to come down.

"Hurts." She muttered desperately, refering to the pain in her head. "Hurts so much." Then her eyes opened a little, and there was a slither of those wonderful green eyes he had missed. She looked up at Jack, the man she had heard inside her head whilst trying to escape from wherever she was. She saw the tears on his face, fresh tears, and she realised that he was the one who was crying. His face looked like it hadn't been shaved for a week, and his hair was completely disheveled.

"I know it does, sweetheart, but it'll pass, it'll pass."

A doctor came into the room, checking her repsonses, and giving her some painkillers. He turned to Jack. "She's going to recover well now, just as long as she rests." Then, as quickly as he appeared, the doctor left again.

The affect of the painkillers was almost immediate. Even though she could still feel pain throbbing throughout her body, it felt more bareable. Now that the doctor was gone, Jack sat back down before her. "Kate?" He said softly. She looked up at him, and she raised her hand, with some considerable effort, to touch his cheek, where tears were still falling.

"You're crying." She said. He didn't wipe away his tears, he closed his eyes and captured her hand in his, holding it tightly to his face.

"I thought I'd lost you." He said in a choked sob.

The sight of his tears and the sound of his choked voice brought tears to her own eyes.

"What happened?" She asked, trying to remember what had happened, but failing.

Jack cleared his throat, speaking as normally as he possibly could. "You had an accident." He said.

"What?"

"When you left my place, you got caught in the tail end of an accident that had already happened." Jack told her. He thought he had been relieved when she had lived through the surgery, but it was nothing to what he was feeling now.

A look of horror struck across her face. She remembered everything now, including why she had left Jack's. "The baby...no, oh no, not again." _After all of this, _she thought, _It's gone anyway. I never even got a chance to be excited about it. _She started to cry, thinking that her child was dead. Jack wiped her tears with his thumb though.

"You nearly died, Kate." He told her. "The doctor came out and said that you might not make it through surgery. I realised that it wasn't only you I would lose. I asked him about the baby, and it said that it put you at more danger, and it might have already been dead." Her cries got stronger, and she covered her face with her hand. Jack leaned down, helped her to sit up, and then embraced her. For the first time in weeks he was able to hold her in his arms, just like he had wanted. "No, Kate, don't worry, it's all right." He assured her, his voice sounding stronger again. "The baby'salive, and you both survived the surgery." She looked up at him, as if she were only going to believe that because he had said it. "You're both going to be fine - I'm gonna take care of you both." He promised her.

"Both? Jack-"

"Kate, I need you to know that I'm so sorry about what I said before. I should have said that I was happy, that I was excited, and most importantly, that I loved you. I just didn't want my child, our child, to grow up like I did, with a second rate father. But then the police phoned, and said that you'd been hurt badly, then the doctor told me that you might not make it - it made me realised how much I didn't want to lose either of you, because it's not about the money, it's about loving our baby." He felt like an enourmous weight had been lifted off him now he had told her. When she smiled weakly at him, the most effort she could manage at the moment, he smiled back, wiping his tears on the back of his jacket sleeve, and placed his hand on her stomach.

"Thank you." She told him softly.

"I can't believe you're all right." He said. "You're awake." Ten minutes ago, he had been in complete dispair, wondering if she would ever wake up at all, and now she was sitting up, relaxed in his arms.

"It'll take more that that to get rid of me." She said stubbornly, but still smiling a little. Sayid was right, she was a survivor. She was so overjoyed that her child was going to be all right, that nothing could dampen her mood at the moment.

"You sure know how to pull a number on me, Kate. I've never been so scared in my entire life." He admitted, burying his face in her hair, relishing in the sweet aroma of it.

"Really?"

"I was terried that I'd never get to see you again, that I'd never hold you in my arms, or tell you how much I loved you and everything about you. Without you, I have nothing, I am nothing. You and our baby are all I've got in my life right now, and I don't want that to change."

Kate's small smile widened a little. "You have no idea how happy I am to hear that." She told him.

"You should get some sleep." He suggested.

"You look like you need it more." She told him.

He gripped her hand tightly. "I'm not going anywhere." He said stubbornly.

"You don't have to." She said, and knowing what she meant, he carefully lay out on the bed beside her. There was easily enough room, and she moved as well as she could to lay her head on his chest. He put his arms tightly around her, and held her close, afraid that she might be taken away from him again otherwise.

"Kate, before you go to sleep, I have to tell you something." He said.

"Yeah?" She replied sleepily.

"I love you." He had finally said it, and it had not come with a wavering voice like he had originally thought.

"You do?" She asked.

"With all my heart, for now and forever." He said in emphasis.

As they drifted off into a peaceful sleep together, he heard her say clearly, "I love you too."


	7. Chapter 7

Kate recovered well, and soon they were back in the hospital, this time, for the birth of their child. Jack had kept to his word, and had taken as much care as Kate would let him in her weakened state, and determined to share the experience, Jack had been at her side throughout the whole labour - all sixteen hours of it. At the end of an exhausting effort for Kate, she held in her arms a beautiful baby boy.

"A boy, Jack, it's a boy." She said excitedly, looking at the crying bundle before her.

Again, Jack felt emotional enough to cry. He told himself that it must have something to do with the hospital smell, he thought. He was a father, at last. He leaned close to Kate and gazed at the little face. He had seen photographs of himself as a baby, and yes, this would definately be a little boy like he was. He was willing to bet money on the eyes being crystal blue though. He already had a rather large amount of hair for a newborn.

"Now that right there, that's my newborn peice of gold." Jack said, kissing Kate. "Thank you."

Suddenly, the room went deathly silent. Jack looked down from where he had just been kissing Kate, and looked down at his son. Panicking, he saw that he wasn't moving, and he wasn't crying anymore either.

"Why isn't he crying?" Kate asked, panicking. "Jack, why isn't he crying?"

"I don't know." He told her, still clentching her hand tightly, but even his was trembling. He turned to the midwife. The midwife ran over and looked at the bundle.

"He's stopped breathing." The midwife said, but her answer wasn't directed at Jack or Kate, it was at the other midwives in the room. The main midwife took the child over to where he had been cleaned up, and began performing the emergency steps to get him to breathe again.

Kate clung to Jack, and started to cry. Jack hugged her back. He had to be ok, he just had to be. Kate was begging who ever was listening not to have her baby taken away from her. "It's alright, he's going to be OK." Jack assured her. "Any minute now, he's gonna be fine, he'll start crying." For the longest minute of their lives, Jack watched and waited while the midwives tried to get the boy to breathe, and Kate hid herself against him, not even being able to bear to look at the midwives gathered around their tiny son.

The midwives franticity panicked them even more. But it was the cry of, "No pulse, no heartbeat," that caused Jack to let out a cry himself. The words were repeated several times, and then one midwife came over to them. In the sudden silence of the midwives, the flatline that had once been a baby's heartbeat could be heard.

"No..." Kate croaked. Their child had already been threatened with death before, and had come through. Surely, after so much survival, he wouldn't die now.

"I'm sorry..." The midwife began, but she never got to finish her sentence.

The sound of a baby screaming filled the air once again, and Kate raised her head, as did Jack. They exchanged hopeful glances. "Is he OK?" She asked tearfully.

"He's all right." A midwife said after a moments observation. "He's all right."

Kate started to cry again, this time with relief. A few moments later, the baby was brought back over to it's parents. Kate took hold of her son, turning her body a little to show Jack. "He's all right." She repeated. "Jack, he's crying, he's all right."

"He's all right." Jack repeated, and then smiled broadly, kissing Kate and stroking a finger down his screaming son's face, never having been more pleased to hear a baby crying. "My son," He whispered, but being so close, Kate heard him, even over the crying of the baby. "My little boy."

Both of them were happy that their little boy was crying again, and were proud with his fight for life even though he was so young - he was already proving to take after his mother.

"What are we gonna call him?" Jack asked.

"I don't know." Kate answered with a shrug. "The only names we agreed on were for a girl."

They had trouble thinking of a boys name during the pregnancy, but had so many different names for a girl. If it were a girl, their were going to name her Lilly, but all of the names they had thought of for a boy didn't seem fitting for their little fighter.

"Alexander." Jack suggested, and then tried out the name. "Alex."

Kate looked up at him. "Yeah. Yeah, that's perfect." She kissed her son's forehead. "Alex."

Jack found it strange how he had once sat in the hospital, thinking that his life was over as he knew it, but now he had sat in a hospital, and had watched a life be brought into the world. A life that he would care for and nurture for the rest of his life. Money was no longer a problem for them now, as three weeks after Jack had left the hospital following her accident, he had got a job working at the same hospital, and this meant that they would have enough money so that Kate wouldn't have to work; and they now had a large enough home that they shared, and enough money between them to give their precious son everything they could wish for. Jack smiled to himself. His mistake eight months ago had nearly cost Kate and Alex their lives, but they were closer now than they had ever been together, so it hadn't all been that bad. After all - they had survived together.

END


End file.
